Most people trading in antiques these days really have no clue what antiques are.
Not Everything That Looks Old Is Old
One of the problems with antiques today is that an awful lot of people selling them don’t actually know what they are selling.
Spend ten minutes on social media and you will see reproduction furniture, copies and “period-style” pieces being confidently described as antiques. Some sellers genuinely believe they are old; others perhaps just know that the words “Georgian style” or “Victorian style” sound rather better than “made last Tuesday”.
And this is not confined to social media.
Some antiques centres are run by people who have not actually been in the antiques trade for very long. There is nothing wrong with being new to the business, of course, but experience matters when you are trying to tell the difference between something that is genuinely 200 years old and something designed to look as though it is.
At Top Banana Antiques, we take that distinction seriously.
Everything we sell is guaranteed to be as described. We believe that if you are buying an antique, you should know what you are buying.
Between our staff alone, we have more than 150 years of experience dealing in antiques, before you even count our dealers — many of whom have been in the trade for 40 years or more.
That experience does not mean we never get anything wrong. Anyone who claims never to have made a mistake in antiques probably has not been doing it for very long.
What it does mean is that we know what questions to ask, what to look for and, importantly, when something is not what it appears to be.
Because “in the style of” is not the same as “from the period”.
And old-looking is not necessarily old.
That is why, at Top Banana, we believe experience matters — and why every item on our website, Top Banana Antiques, is guaranteed to be as described.
After all, you should not need 150 years of experience to buy an antique.
Fortunately, we have already got it.
Leave a comment
Comments will be approved before showing up.
